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He gave the order for retreat, and the startled Apaches made a rush for their ponies, hidden in an arroyo. Bear Claw scrambled after them, with lead kicking up dust all about him. But it did not take Bear Claw long to see that his band outnumbered the white posse, more than four to one. Throwing himself on his horse, he decided to set his renegade warriors an example.
Again the tapping, and this time with it a quick, low, imperious call. "Mr. Street. Are you there? Let me in!" He knew that voice would have known it among a thousand. In another moment he had raised the window softly and Beulah Rutherford was climbing in. She panted as if she had been running. "They're watching the entrance to the arroyo.
He believed that if Lawler had told him he had come to take him for blotting out the Circle L brand in the arroyo the preceding night he would have killed Lawler. But he was not sure. Something about Lawler made the thought of shooting him seem ridiculous. It would take a lot of provocation for any man to kill Lawler, for something about Lawler seemed to hint that it couldn't be done.
Once he struck his fleshy forehead, and then turned with gritting teeth and galloped back for the point at which he had first arrived. To his maddened brain it occurred that the current of the arroyo might by this have somewhat abated. He might now make his way across it.
Ned quickly decided. He remembered how they had escaped up the bed of the creek when they were besieged by Urrea, and if one could leave by an arroyo, one could also approach by it. He rode to the group of trees that had been designated as the place of meeting, and left his horse there.
He was gazing off down the arroyo and riding with all his weight on one stirrup and the other foot swinging free, as is the nonchalant way of accustomed riders who would ease their muscles now and then. But as he passed the rock where she was sitting he murmured, "Tonight by the rock I wait for you, querida mia."
Cautiously, cautiously they harked and peered; they gently parted the weeds and wormed in, closing the weeds behind them again. The arroyo was empty. In the first tinge of gray they crouched under the high bank overhung by the weeds, to wait. The night had passed, and here they were, abroad in the very thick of the Indians, to face a day of unknown perils. It was to be a long, long day.
Working swiftly, he changed his clothes. Then, after again looking at his reflection, he put out the light, stepped outside, locked the door, and mounted his horse. Riding a ridge above a shallow arroyo he came upon a little level near a grove of cottonwood trees. He circled one side of the grove, and in a clearing he saw the Nyland cabin.
Before her lifted the saw-toothed range into a sky of blue sprinkled here and there with light mackerel clouds. Blacky pranced with fire and intelligence, eager to reach out and leave behind him the sunny miles. Near the upper end of the park she swung up an arroyo that led to Big Flat Top. A drawling voice stopped her. "Oh, you, Beulah Rutherford! Where away this glad mo'ning?"
Flinging his legs over each side of the ladder, Coyote Pete slid to the ground like a boy sliding down a cellar door. "I could catch the glint of sunlight on their rifles," he explained. "The beggars were trying to approach unseen, though, I guess, for they were sneaking round a neck of woods so as to take advantage of that arroyo that runs almost up to the mine. Better get busy with that borer."
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